A dispute · spans 2 eras
Is virtue knowledge?
If we really knew what was good, would we always do it?
Socrates' provocative claim: no one does evil knowingly. If you act badly, it is because you misunderstand what is genuinely good for you. Virtue, on this view, just is correct knowledge of the good. Aristotle objects: people do know better and act worse – they suffer from akrasia, weakness of will. The dispute reappears in every century, from Augustine's confession that he willed evil knowing it was evil, to modern debates about whether wrongdoing is best treated as ignorance, weakness, vice, or compulsion.
// The sides
Virtue is knowledge
No one does evil knowingly: whoever truly knows what is good for them does it, and every bad act betrays a mistaken grasp of the good – for even evil is chosen under the guise of some good.